Following a unanimous vote by our Board of Directors, we are honored to officially endorse William “Will” Lawrence for the United States House of Representatives in Michigan’s 7th Congressional District.
In Will, we recognize an organizer whose leadership was not forged in backrooms or shaped by political ambition, but cultivated through patient, accountable work alongside everyday families. He does not approach his communities’ struggles as theoretical policy puzzles to be solved from above. As someone who has spent years organizing on the ground – fighting tenant evictions, standing with families defending their homes, and mentoring young leaders to build durable grassroots power – Will understands governance as an extension of community care. He knows how to listen because he has done the sacred work of sitting at kitchen tables, hearing the anxieties and hopes of working people, and organizing collectively to turn vulnerability into power.
Mid-Michigan sits at a critical crossroads where corporate extraction directly threatens the basic foundations of community life. From the industrial neighborhoods of Lansing to the generational farmlands across Ingham, Eaton, Clinton, Livingston, and Shiawassee counties, working families are forced to shoulder escalating utility bills and punitive shutoffs, even as private monopoly utilities extract record profits. Simultaneously, unchecked and speculative corporate developments, such as massive data center corridors that swallow enormous amounts of public energy and water resources, threaten to drive household costs even higher while straining our regional ecosystems. Will possesses the wisdom and backbone to confront this extraction directly. He understands that clean drinking water, fertile soil, breathable air, and accessible utilities are not speculative commodities; they are foundational requirements for human survival.
Michigan’s 7th District is an important battleground. Defeating an entrenched corporate incumbent like Tom Barrett is about far more than shifting partisan majorities; it is about restoring true democratic agency to working-class people whose labor sustains our communities, yet whose voices have been systematically bypassed. When Will Lawrence enters the Capitol, he will carry the hopes, the resilience, and the righteous prayers of Mid-Michigan with him. USMUST is proud to walk shoulder-to-shoulder with him to ensure our people’s votes translate into tangible protection, systemic justice, and enduring community power.
— Ife Kilimanjaro, Executive Director & Chief Political Officer, on behalf of the Board of Directors
